Alessandro e l'Oceano. Modelli declamatòri nelle Historiae Alexandri Magni di Curzio Rufo e nell'Anabasi di Arriano

The fictitious theme of Seneca the Elder’s suasoria 1, Deliberat Alexander an Oceanum naviget, is primarily inspired to the historical episode of the so-called ‘Hyphasis mutiny’, when Alexander, on the point of entering India and possibly reaching the oriental Ocean, was forced to come back by a mutiny of his soldiers. The historical treatment of this episode by historians like Curtius Rufus and Arrian is strongly influenced by declamatory models, as shown by the many parallels with the first Senecan suasoria, and in particular the speeches pronunced on the occasion by Alexaxder and Coenus, one of his generals, are in both historians conceived as rhetorical suasoriae.